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Chapter 16:
Grant had originally been very much averse to the proposition to impeach the
President.
Suggestions of this proceeding had been made as early as 1866, and in May of that year
Grant wrote to
Washburne, who was then in
Europe: ‘But little is heard now about impeachment.
It is sincerely to be hoped that we will not, unless something occurs hereafter to fully justify it.’
It was not until
Johnson's removal of
Stanton and the appointment of
Lorenzo Thomas as
Secretary of War, and after his own violent differences with the
President, that
Grant looked with favor on this extreme measure.
But when the motion for impeachment was finally passed he heartily approved it. He took the liveliest interest in the proceedings, and though he preserved a proper reticence in his public utterances, he did not scruple with those in his confidence to express his opinion that the action of Congress was entirely justified.
He refused, however, to visit the Senate during the trial, and did nothing inconsistent with the dignity of his position.
But the election for
President was now only a few months off, and from the time of the publication of his final correspondence with
Johnson it was evident that
Grant must be the candidate of the Republicans.
He no longer declined to acknowledge this probability, or to converse on the subject; and the leaders of the party continually consulted him during the progress of the trial.
Before its conclusion he was formally nominated for the Presidency, and he would have
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been untrue to his implied obligations had he failed to sympathize with his supporters in a matter so momentous as their battle with the
President.
His political convictions, as I have shown, had been forming and crystallizing for several years, amid the changing circumstances and contingencies of the time; but the action of
Johnson undoubtedly precipitated his conclusions.
For
Grant was subject to all the ordinary feelings and even passions of a man, and the long series of attempts first to beguile and cajole him, and afterward to entrap and misrepresent him, had their natural effect.
They went hand in hand with what he thought the
President's endeavors to thwart and frustrate the law, and the will of the loyal
North.
Finally, when
Johnson at the same juncture assailed
Grant's personal honor and defied the authority of Congress, the soldier resented one action while the citizen condemned the other.
Doubtless the imputations on his character sharpened his appreciation of the public misconduct of his enemy; no one is proof against inducements and influences like these; but the fact did not lessen the purity of his conduct or the integrity of his motives.
Christianity itself mingles personal considerations with those of abstract right and wrong; and a man who has been struck in a righteous cause is hardly to be blamed if he returns the blow with increased and indignant zeal.
Grant, I repeat, was very human; tempted in all points like other men; he was made neither of wood nor stone, but of flesh and blood; and at this juncture the fervor of his public spirit was certainly intensified by his indignation at
Johnson's behavior toward himself.
But he committed no injustice.
He resented his own wrongs, yet he made no display of rancor and descended to no unworthy wiles.
He was at one time summoned before Congress, but he rigidly confined his testimony to what he had seen and known, and refused to exaggerate either the language or acts of the
President or his own impressions of
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them; although he was certain that this very moderation would be an argument in
Johnson's favor.
Nevertheless, when he thought it his duty to take an important step, he did not hesitate.
At the crisis of the trial it became evident that some of the
Republican Senators were uncertain as to their judgment or their course, and
Grant was urged to use his influence with them.
The
Senators were judges, it is true, but this was a political trial, and
Grant believed that he had a right to support the weak and confirm the strong in so grave an emergency.
He not only conversed with those whose action he thought he could affect, arguing in favor of the conviction of
Johnson and demonstrating his guilt, but he visited at least one Senator at his house with this purpose.
This was
Mr. Frelinghuysen.
Grant told me of his intention before he paid the visit, and returned greatly gratified, for though
Frelinghuysen had not disclosed his intention he had said enough to assure
Grant of his views.
Two or three days afterward
Frelinghuysen voted in favor of conviction.
The day before the verdict was rendered a remarkable scene occurred at
Grant's headquarters.
Benjamin F. Wade, the presiding officer of the Senate, would in case of the deposition of
Johnson immediately become
President.
Naturally he was considering this possibility.
He was an ardent Republican, and a friend and supporter of
General Grant.
He came to
Grant's office while I was present and said: ‘General, I am here to consult with you about my Cabinet, in case
Mr. Johnson is found guilty.’
I was allowed to remain during the interview.
Mr. Wade then went on to say that as
Grant was the candidate of the Republican party and would undoubtedly be elected, he wished to make no temporary appointments that would be unacceptable to his probable successor.
Grant listened attentively but offered no suggestions of his own. The matter was profoundly delicate, and yet it was not improper for these two men, who
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might each in turn and so soon become the
Head of the
State, to compare their plans.
Wade mentioned several names for Cabinet positions, and ascertained that
Grant would not object to them.
Stanton's, of course, was one of these.
But
Grant made no revelation of his own purposes, if indeed they were formed, and there was no discussion of policy; about that they would doubtless be in accord.
The interview lasted perhaps half an hour.
But the next day
Johnson was acquitted, and
Wade never made a Cabinet.
He got very close to greatness; the vote of one man in the Senate excluded him.
Grant was at first very much disappointed at the result of the trial, and said so to some of his intimates; but he was discreet, and forebore to make his feeling public or its expression in any way indecorous.
After a while his judgment changed, and he thought on the whole it was better for the country that the
President should not have been removed.
He believed that
Johnson had been taught a lesson which he would not forget, and that the precedent of a successful impeachment would have been a greater misfortune to the
State than any evil that
Johnson might still have been able to accomplish.
In addition to this I heard him say that a fear of
Wade's well-known bitterness and lack of restraint reconciled him more easily to enduring
Johnson a little longer.
He even suggested that a similar apprehension might have influenced some of the
Republican Senators who had voted for acquittal.
As years went by
Grant's judgment changed on several points in regard to which at this time he was very decided.
He found the Tenure of Office act a great obstruction to his own authority as
President, and was anxious for a much greater modification of its provisions than Congress was willing to concede.
Yet he had been strongly in favor of curtailing
Johnson's powers.
He justified this apparent inconsistency by declaring that the times had been unusual,
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the man exceptional; and that what was indispensable immediately after a great civil convulsion in order to prevent further commotions and possibly revolution, was unnecessary and indefensible in the ordinary years of peace.
Grant indeed was never willing to let constitutional restrictions bind the
State so that it could not save itself.
He was full of reverence for law, but that the Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath, was a doctrine to which in all things he subscribed.
He was heartily glad when the turmoil of the impeachment was over, and was entirely satisfied to have a prominent Republican like
Evarts accept a seat in
Johnson's Cabinet.
There were many in his party who disapproved the course of
Evarts at this juncture.
They were indignant even that he should defend the
President professionally, and still more so when he consented to become a member of
Johnson's Government.
But
Grant himself had set the precedent, and could not condemn the man who followed it. Both he and
Stanton had held places in the same Cabinet while disapproving the policy of its chief; and he thought and said that
Evarts, especially as the legal adviser of the Administration, might be able to act as a useful check, and thus do the country important service.
He was glad also to have one man in the
Cabinet with whom in most matters he could sympathize.
The result of the trial was a crushing and intolerable blow to
Stanton, from which he never recovered.
Although there lacked but one vote of the two-thirds of the Senate necessary to convict the
President, the verdict was in some sort a condemnation of the
Secretary.
It implied that he should not have remained in the
Cabinet against the will of his chief, and it made it imperative on him immediately to resign.
General Schofield was at once nominated by the
President for the position of
Secretary of War.
Grant still retained some of the heat of the contest and wrote to
Schofield,
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who was then in command at
Richmond: ‘Under the circumstances I advise you to decline the Secretaryship in advance.’
But
Schofield started for
Washington and went at once to visit
Grant, who revised his opinion, and
Schofield entered the
Cabinet with the full concurrence of the
General-in-Chief.
He displayed rare ability in his difficult position.
He was able to perform his duties with efficiency, so as to satisfy the
President, and at the same time not offend the Legislature nor the party that had sought to overthrow his chief.
A subordinate of
Grant in the army and his personal friend, owing indeed to
Grant much of his advancement, he behaved to his great inferior with consummate tact and delicacy, deferring to him whenever this was proper, and nevertheless maintaining the dignity of his own position.
Their relations were always extremely cordial.
With
Evarts and
Schofield in the
Cabinet,
Grant was able, even as the candidate of the party that was so hostile to the
President, to retain something like concord with the
Government.
I knew
Johnson personally; not very well, but well enough to see that he had immense cunning and persistency; and it seemed clear to me that in the contest with his
Secretary of War the
President, clothed with all the powers of his great office, would in the end prevail, and that
Stanton would sometime, somehow, be ousted from his place, and our long intimacy, I thought, warranted me in writing him the most earnest letter that I could pen, urging him to resign in the very beginning of the contest with his chief.
I now have his reply in which he says that his wife warmly indorsed my letter, but that every other friend was against it; that those in the Senate and the
House who had stood so faithfully by him during the war implored him to remain; and that duty, patriotism, and fidelity to party all demanded that he should ‘stick.’ . . . I was in
Washington and dined with the
Secretary at his house in K street, on the day when
General Grant
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announced to
Stanton that the
President had urged him (
General Grant) to accept the office of
Secretary of War, and that the
General had accepted the offer.
The day was warm, and during the early twilight we sat in the wide hall with the street door open, talking upon this very subject, when
General Grant came slowly up the steps.
After the usual greeting and the passing of a few words, the
General said to the
Secretary that he wanted to speak with him, and the two retired to the library.
They were absent from ten to fifteen minutes, and both looked troubled on their return.
The General went away, only saying ‘Good evening.’
Stanton, with a suppressed agitation which was
very marked, but in calm language, told me the purport of the interview and of what
Sumner and other
Senators had said to make him ‘stick.’
He then said: ‘You and
Mrs. Stanton are the only ones who gave me good advice and I ought to have followed it.’